


It's planting seeds in a garden you never get to see.

by Catkin_Thief



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Introspection, What is a legacy, what does harry leave behind him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-23
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2019-01-21 20:39:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12465528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Catkin_Thief/pseuds/Catkin_Thief
Summary: What is a your legacy, Harry Potter?What are you leaving behind you?





	It's planting seeds in a garden you never get to see.

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, so, I wrote this at eleven last night, when I couldn't get the lyrics to the Alexander Hamilton song, "The World Was Wide Enough" out of my head, and somehow this was born. I may write more chapters, for the rest of the Golden Trio, but I'm not sure.
> 
>  
> 
> Disclaimer: All the characters belong to JK Rowling etc. etc.

 

What is a legacy?

Is it the way your hands tremble when you hold your firstborn son? Is it the horror in your wife’s eyes when your daughter asks for a diary, the way she drops the teapot and Lily Luna never asks again? Is it the catch in your voice the first time you try and cast ‘Expelliarmus’ after the war? Is it the grief you hear when Albus says, “Nice one James!”, the way you cry when they want to call the abandoned puppy they find ‘Padfoot’?

Or,

Is it the way a thousand children grow up without the shadow of a war you sacrificed everything for? Is it the blue-haired little boy who has his father’s eyes six days out of ten, who manages the impossible and calls a cease-fire between you and Malfoy? Is it the fact that James Sirius feels more at home on a broomstick than he ever has on his own two feet, is it Albus Severus’ habit of wandering the castle after curfew, is it Lily Luna’s penchant for getting into mischief?

Or,

Is it the Death Eaters and other Dark wizards you capture with Ron at your side and hand over to the Ministry for the Kiss? The foundation you start in the name of Remus Lupin for those that society shuns? The laws that you push through the Wizengamot, with Hermione at your shoulder, helping her in her fight for equality the only way you can? The Defence textbook that bears both your names, that becomes part of the curriculum for the next fifty years, before it is surpassed by one your eldest granddaughter writes?

 

Ten generations from now, the Potters still have your mother’s eyes, your wife’s freckles and your father’s hair and crooked grin. More of your descendants than you can count are called ‘Harry’ but none of them have to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs. When your eldest grandchild goes to Hogwarts, it is twice the size it was when you attended, bursting at the seams with children. She’s sorted into Slytherin, and within a week she has friends in every house. Her Herbology teacher is Neville Longbotton, and he teaches with the quiet confidence he found in a Hogwarts under siege.

 

What is your legacy, Harry Potter?

(It’s the three children named for those you lost, but they take the names and make them their own, and you never think of your lost when you look at them. It’s the penchant for raising trouble, the messy hair and the crooked grin, that always announces a Potter child. It’s a Wizarding World that is free of war, a school that is no longer a battleground. And it’s a quiet child in every generation, who looks out of the window when they should be concentrating and dreams of flying.)

 

What are you leaving behind you?

(What you have always given those who follow you: Hope.)


End file.
